Just like a car crash….

She ran through traffic, heedless of her direction, side aching and lungs burning as she gasped for breath. Horns blasted into her ears, directly into her ears, but she didn't hear them. She only heard the wild beating of her heart as she fought to gain ground on her pursuers. And the insidious whisper inside her mind.

Just like a knife….

She hit the sidewalk and kept running, into the dark embrace of an alley, dodging trash bags and a homeless vagrant as she desperately, prayerfully hoped that she hadn't chosen a dead end. She knew They were behind her, even though she couldn't have seen or heard them. She knew They were closing, tracking her, tracing her movements, undistracted by the minds around them. She knew They wanted her, more than they had wanted the other.

That was good. The witch was still free then. But she was going to die.

She saw an end to the alley and bolted for it, but she arrived too late. The mouth of the alley was blocked by three dark figures. Ahead and behind her, she knew without needing to look. She could feel the emptiness of them, like a void that sucked all sound and all light into them and created a shadow in the mind's eye.

She looked around. There was a piece of broken glass. She snatched it up.

"Come with us," the insidious voices whispered, the blank eyes of the foremost figure burning into her as he reached out. She knew, somehow, that his touch would be only ice. "Join us. Be part of us, no longer solus, but conlatio. Be One."

"I would rather die," she sobbed, and she raised the shard to her throat. She could slit it… but suddenly she was afraid. Too afraid to do it. And when he touched her, the cold burn made her drop the glass.

As her personality, her memories, everything that she considered part of herself were drained away from her and assimilated into the mind at the Core of the One, she wished once more for death. But she got only blackness, and their voices inside her head.

Now….. you are One.

Just like a car crash, just like a knife, my favorite weapon is the look in your eye.

Silence.

X-X-X

"This city is a godforsaken dump," Schuldich complained as the limousine carried them away from the airport and into the heavy, close-situated architecture that defined New York City. Across from him, Brad Crawford gave him a look of mild annoyance and then returned his attention to the dossiers he'd removed from his briefcase. On Schuldich's right, Farfarello pressed his hands against the tinted window and watched the city pass by in a blur of gray and brown stone and shining glass, and on Schuldich's left, Naoe Nagi sat quietly staring out the window also, lost in thoughts Schuldich didn't feel like invading, at the moment.

Next to Crawford, Takatori Reiji sat in his expensive suit, looking less than thrilled with his proximity to both Farfarello and Schuldich and mumbling to himself about discourteous and sloppy Americans. Crawford, to his credit, said nothing even though he was American himself, and New York was his home.

"I mean it," Schuldich repeated with disgust. "Look at this. Human filth, ineffective police, sloppy construction . . this place could use a makeover." He smirked suddenly, and nudged the lithe, pale body at his side. "Hey Farfie, what do you say we change the scenery a little? Put a little fear of the devil in this city?"

Farfarello turned, regarding him silently with his single, remaining amber-colored eye. He said nothing, but Schuldich reached into his thoughts and sneered when he found that for once, Farfarello wasn't fixating on murder or the pain of God. His interest was with the city, which he'd never seen before. He was thinking about how different New York was from Tokyo, and Schuldich had to agree with him there. New York, at least, had some class still clinging to its ancient facades, whereas Tokyo was nothing but a glittering, painted whore trying to cling to the past and sell the future at the same time.

"Attention from the American authorities is the last thing we need, Schuldich," Crawford told him crisply as he replaced his documents in his briefcase and snapped the case shut. "Your games will have to be put on hold for the duration of our stay."

"But all work and no play makes Farfie antsy," Schuldich shot back, fingertips skating across the Irishman's thigh. "And we didn't bring the straightjacket."

Crawford gave him a look of dry amusement. "Actually, it's with my things."

Schuldich made a frustrated sound and threw up his hands as Crawford, smirking to himself, leaned in to speak quietly with Takatori. It was somewhat pleasant to be back in New York, though the place held relatively few memories for him. Takatori's determination to visit some of his failing branches of business here and intimidate his people back into shape was what had dragged Schwarz here in the first place . . as Takatori's bodyguards, their duty was to accompany him on trips such as these and see to his safety. Fortunately, Takatori didn't leave town often, though Crawford had to admit that this little excursion was a relief. It would be nice to get away from Tokyo for a while. Nice to get away from Weiß.

Thankfully, Crawford foresaw no danger to his employer popping up in the near future, so he found himself able to somewhat relax, although Brad Crawford, as a trained agent of Eszet and a professional in all things, never fully let down his guard. For one thing, he was being paid to be on the alert even when his precognitive abilities told him the future was clear. For another, letting one's guard, and hence one's shields, down around Schuldich was just a bad idea.

Currently, the redhead was occupied with sprawling in his seat and looking utterly bored, with his arm draped casually across the pale shoulders of Farfarello, who didn't seem to mind. For not the first time, Crawford wondered about the nature of the rapport the telepath and the madman seemed to share. Farfarello tolerated behavior from Schuldich that he would kill another person for, and out of all of Schwarz, Schuldich seemed the only one who held any sort of understanding of what, exactly, was going on in that twisted head. Crawford didn't think they were fucking. Given Farfarello's fondness for knives, the evidence of that would have been impossible to hide. But there was a lot one could do, sexually, that didn't necessarily involve sex, and he hadn't ruled out the possibility that those two might share a relationship that hovered on one of those lesser stages.

He knew that Schuldich and Farfarello sometimes shared kills. With further consideration, only morbid curiosity made him even wonder what else they shared.

Pushing his glasses back up his nose with one slender finger, Crawford checked his mental shields again, finding them sound, and set his mind to the task at hand . . frightening the hell out of Aaron Meyer, the man whom Takatori had placed in charge of the first corporation they were being driven to. Crawford was paid to be alert always, to take notes, to plot and to scheme and to use the interests of his employer to advance the interests of Eszet. Nagi was paid to be their expert in all things computer. But at this particular meeting, all Farfarello and Schuldich were being paid for was to stand there and be scary.

As much as Brad didn't want to admit it, the pair of them together could accomplish that objective far too well.

X-X-X

Farfarello crouched on the narrow sill of his new window, this one much bigger than the one at Schwarz headquarters, and with a better view. His room was nicer too, and though he'd heard Crawford say that he'd brought the straightjacket along, there were no hooks with which to suspend him from the ceiling.

Not that either measure held him for long.

For now, though, he was free and he had managed to retrieve one of his knives from his luggage before Crawford thought to confiscate them all. He chewed on the slender blade now, idly, his own blood staining his lips as he ate up the view of the city.

New York fascinated him.

He couldn't exactly put his finger on what it was about this place that was so grand, so new and old at the same time, so arresting, but Farfarello didn't need reasons. It was enough for him that it was so. And so he sat with his knees against his chest and his arms looped around them, knife dangling from his mouth as a trickle of blood ran down his chin, following for a half-inch the line of the scar that trailed from his lower lip to the back of his jaw. Then it broke free and hung for a moment at the crest of his chin, before dropping and losing itself against the skintight black clothing he wore. His pants were leather, bondage, tied together by a loose strap just above his knees. That simple. He liked the more elaborate designs, wanted some of those, not to be restrained with, but to enhance the look he liked for himself. Perhaps he could persuade Schuldich to take him shopping, since Crawford didn't like Farfarello being out on his own. His sleeveless top was lined with Kevlar, a precaution taken because in the heat of battle, Farfarello was unlikely to notice a fatal bullet wound.

There were benefits and curses to the inability to feel pain. Farfarello tended to think of it as a curse, a trick of The Liar's, when God had taken his pain away and in doing so, disconnected Farfarello from the race of his beloved children. He could no longer feel, so he was no longer human, no longer beloved. By that reasoning, Crawford had better standing with God than Farfarello did. But the Irishman didn't particularly mind that. He didn't want standing with God, except as an Adversary. He had tasted the tainted love of the deity whose lies were greater and more insidious than Lucifer's, and he hungered now for The Liar's blood. Crawford had said no killing on this trip, because New York City was not as overcrowded as Tokyo, and murders (at least the type of murder Farfarello was responsible for, which fell more under the category of rabid mutilation) were far less likely to go unnoticed, especially if he performed them on the clergy, as he had a habit of doing. But with Crawford's attention taken up by Takatori's escapades, Farfarello thought he and Schuldich would have more than enough opportunity to go out and perform their desecrations in peace.

The police would not find them. They never had.

The door to his room cracked open, and Schuldich stepped inside, running slender fingers along the door jam. He was checking it for the feasibility of adding another few bolts. This, Farfarello knew without needing Schuldich's mind-reading powers. The telepath glanced up at him and smirked, and flicked a few strands of orange-red hair out of his sharp, dark blue eyes. Ever-vain, Schuldich took great pride in that mane of hair and in his own delicate, wickedly sensuous features. When he bothered, the German could put on such a captivating appearance that even without the aid of his Gifts, both men and women surrendered to him without a word of protest, enslaved by his trademark smirk and the grace of his lanky body.

Schuldich was Farfarello's ally in the war against God.

"Enjoying the view, Farfie?" he inquired silkily, hands shoving deep into the pockets of his dark-colored jacket as he searched for his cigarettes and found them, and his lighter. The flame flickered, and Farfarello turned his attention from the window to watch it dance.

Schuldich dragged on the cigarette and put the lighter away, and Farfarello went back to staring out his window.

"You like it here, don't you?" Schuldich's voice was a bit quieter, a tone for a private conversation between them. Though Schuldich had told Farfarello nothing of the sort, the one-eyed member of Schwarz knew the reasons they had long, intimate, and meaningful conversations, usually after their two teammates were asleep; Schuldich was the only one who would talk freely to Farfarello, and Farfarello was the only one who would listen to Schuldich.

He answered Schuldich's inquiry by tracing his fingertips down the cool glass, lips parting just a bit as he watched the movements of a street he could just barely see between the buildings. "This is a city of decadence," he said frankly, nails clicking against the glass. "Modern Sodom, an eyesore to God."

Schuldich leaned against the window frame, body stretching sensuously against the plaster as he ducked his head to look, to see what Farfarello saw. "And some say God smote New York City just like he smote Sodom," he remarked slyly, nodding off to the south. Farfarello didn't need to see the skyline to know that he was indicating the smoking, rubbled holes where the World Trade Center used to stand. "Fire from the sky… sounds appropriate, doesn't it?" He laughed.

Farfarello considered this, and then turned the golden depths of his gaze on the telepath. "God was responsible," he agreed slowly, his slight accent giving his voice a seductively lyrical cadence. "But to punish was not his intent. This was a sign, a cruelly phrased message. 'Turn back to me, America! Repent!'" His head swiveled mechanically and he smirked at the city, amber eye narrowing in an expression that had frightened trained assassins into backing down more than once. "But America is wicked and unashamed. She will never repent. She reminds me of you, Schuldich," Farfarello said slyly, lips twitching as he glanced at the telepath to catch his response.

Schuldich snorted, but he considered what Farfarello had said, and at length, he nodded. "Bringing down heaven and raising up a whore. Was that the line? Only a country as arrogant as the United States could get away with something like that. Japan's been trying and failing . . no matter how much they want to, they just can't be the West."

"The Crucible," Farfarello affirmed, then fell silent.

"Mmm." Schuldich watched the city and his expression was sly and satisfied, like the proverbial cat after having eaten the proverbial canary. "Such a delightful nest of wickedness. Want to explore it with me? Maybe tonight?"

"Crawford said to stay here," Farfarello told him tonelessly. He didn't particularly care about Crawford's orders, and he knew that Schuldich was even less concerned.

"Fuck Crawford," Schuldich said cheerfully, predictably. "Good and hard too, so the stick dislodges from his ass… I need some R and R." He ran his fingers down the glass pane now, cruel hunger flashing in his face as he looked over the city. "I need to taste New York."

"I want to go shopping," Farfarello told him, and Schuldich laughed.

"Sure thing, Farfie-chan. We'll go shopping, we'll catch a movie, and then we'll see what kind of underground club scene this pathetic excuse for a hive of scum and villainy has. You up for that?"

"I am up for anything," Farfarello informed him, and Schuldich smirked.

"Excellent."

X-X-X

They had gone shopping and they had seen the new Sinbad movie. They had spent most of the movie in the back, Schuldich loudly commenting on the movie and throwing popcorn at Farfarello as Farfarello eyed the screen and chewed thoughtfully on a needle.

And after the movie was over, after a quick stop back at the hotel to change into their new clothes, Schuldich dragged Farfarello downtown with him.

At present, they had descended into the sort of places Farfarello supposed reminded Schuldich of his childhood, a heavy, techno beat making his ribcage throb as dozens of bodies writhed together on a packed dance floor, the strobing lights and dim bar lighting the only available illumination. Farfarello was leaning against the edge of the bar, its metal railing biting into his hip. He could feel the pressure, but not the discomfort. His gaze was fixed on Schuldich as the German writhed on the dance floor, pressed between several bodies and skillfully grinding against all of them in turn. Schuldich was dressed in skintight leather pants and a mesh top, with a heavy collar around his neck. The perfect slave, red hair loose and flying, blue eyes sly and lined in black, flushed and beautiful. He looked, ironically, like a fallen angel, an Incubus who could lead anyone to their doom and keep them eager all the way.

Beckon them off the cliff and they will follow you, sing to them with your body and they will lust for you…

Schuldich caught those thoughts and sent Farf a smoldering, sultry look, beckoning with his eyes even as he slipped out from between a couple of the bodies. His message was clear: there was room, if Farfarello wanted it.

Farfarello didn't want it.

He had found new clothes that he was very pleased with, a sleeveless top of some thick and firm material, with a high collar almost like a priest's. It zipped up the front, and attached to the zipper was a large steel ring that rested against his chest. His pants had two straps across the back, and he liked the weight of them. Twin zippers up the shins allowed him a choice between a straight-leg and a boot-cut fit, and he had chosen straight-leg, so the zippers there and on each thigh glittered in the dim light, along with the rings and hooks attached to the waistband. His trademark bandage was still wrapped around his bicep, his fingerless gloves still on his hands, and he'd managed to hide about half a dozen knives in various places in the outfit.

Farfarello was very pleased.

So far, he hadn't attracted any attention, at least, any attention bold enough to saunter up and ask if he wanted to dance. Schuldich could wander onto a dance floor and instantly be surrounded by partners, but Farfarello preferred his solitude and he got it, lounging against the cool wood of the bar and idly drinking a beer Schuldich had insisted on ordering for him. All the devil's children . . he liked to watch them. Liked to watch them dance and writhe, bodies moving in senseless abandon, fucking, shooting up, drinking, all high on one thing or another. The club was a veritable mass of pheromones; no wonder Schuldich was so comfortable here. Those scents, they attracted Farf, but not so much that he would go and mingle.

Schuldich danced without break for almost four hours, and Farfarello refrained from ordering any more drinks after the first. After all, someone would have to make sure Schuldich made it back to the hotel in relative safety. The press of so many minds was hard on the telepath, and he was liable to dance himself into a dead faint. That was assuming he didn't get a hold of one of the many different escapes available on the market. Crawford frowned on drug use, and Schuldich rarely indulged in it, but on occasion… he slipped.

Just as Farfarello was beginning to become seriously impatient, he spotted Schuldich, flushed and sweaty, heading toward him.

"That was good," the German purred, brushing up against Farfarello deliberately as he demanded an Amaretto Sour. "You oughtta try it, Farfie, I seriously think you could--"

Schuldich's speech was interrupted as the telepath doubled over, hands pressed to his head, crying out in intense pain as a scream echoed throughout the mind of everyone in the bar, the cry of a telepath in trouble, very loud and close enough to be deafening. Everyone in the club collapsed under the brief onslaught, but then it was suddenly over. In the instant that most of the patrons were still doubled over, Farfarello caught sight of a dark figure moving quickly toward the rear exit. When Schuldich straightened, he seized Farfarello's arm and headed toward that exit as well.

"Come on," he hissed, and Farfarello followed silently as Schuldich dragged him through the heavy steel door and into the alley behind the club. His power cloaked them, making them invisible to the minds of the people in the alley, and Farfarello was given a moment to survey the scene.

There were five players on this small stage. Three were dressed in suits, their eyes blank and devoid of personality. One of the suits was holding onto a handsome young man with platinum blonde hair and sky blue eyes, wide with terror. The suit had his hand to the boy's forehead, and whatever he was doing was causing the boy to cry out and convulse.

The last player was a small female in her late teens, dressed in black, with ebony hair tumbling around small, bare shoulders. She was in a half-defensive, half-aggressive position, obviously enraged, but too terrified to actually attack. Schuldich tilted his head and narrowed his eyes appraisingly, then elbowed Farfarello. "Give me a knife."

Slender fingers slid into his vest-like top and produced a blade about eleven inches long, serrated near the base, with a flat hilt and no guard. Schuldich took a step toward the girl and flipped the knife, dropping his shield and presenting her with the knife, hilt-first. She started when she saw them, and the three suits took notice.

Schuldich's tone was wicked. "If you have something to protect," he said silkily, "take the knife."

Perhaps he was expecting her to balk when faced with an actual weapon, or the prospect of killing someone. Instead, eyes so dark they were almost black flicked up to meet Schuldich's and she seized the knife out of his hand. The light behind the boy telepath's eyes was fading fast. Farfarello was mildly impressed when she screamed, a coughing, panther-like roar, and charged the suit holding the boy.

One small hand reached out and Farfarello felt the backwash of a biokinetic as he reached out with the power of his mind to freeze the girl in mid-motion. But she pushed through it, showing remarkable will in the face of such power, and while her empty hand seized the boy by his thick blonde hair and jerked him forward out of the biokinetic's grasp, she slammed the knife toward the suit's torso.

The boy crashed to the ground and metal imbedded in flesh with a sound like wet hamburger dropped on a sidewalk, a sort of squelching sound Farfarello was highly familiar with. The suit staggered as the other two moved to help and the girl tangled her legs in the suit's, knocking him down. Once on the ground, she slammed the knife into his heart and he ceased to move even as a female suit reached out toward her forehead.

How risky it was to touch these creatures, Farf didn't know. But the girl's hand wrapped around the female suit's wrist and jerked her forward as she drove the knife up into her throat, straight through the spinal column. She whirled, breathing hard through gritted teeth, a familiar rage in her almost-black eyes.

The third suit held a firearm to the head of her companion.

She shrieked, a sound of rage that caused Schuldich to raise an irritated hand to his ears, and leaped for the gun. It went off and blood splattered from the far side of the boy's torso. A flesh wound, it would go straight through and be easily fixed if they got him to a hospital immediately. But Farfarello's mind wasn't on the wound. He was fixed, staring with lips parted in awe, at the young woman who had bowled the third suit over and was now straddling its chest, slamming the knife repeatedly into it and making the noises of a wild animal, growls and snarls. The suit's body convulsed and eventually was still, but she continued to bloody the corpse, raking the knife through the soft tissues of the body as blood spattered across flawless alabaster skin.

Schuldich smirked and sent out a mental probe. Don't you think you ought to see to your friend?

Her head jerked up and she twisted, catlike. But then her expression of bloodlust faded into dismay and she scrambled to the body of her friend. "RAY!" she snapped, waving a hand in front of his eyes, then slapping him hard across the face. "RAY! Wake the fuck up! Shit…." She laid the knife down and checked his wound, the blood pumping out through it, staining the sidewalk and leaving him pale. Her eyes fixed on Schuldich. "Call 911," she snapped at him, but he merely laughed.

He stopped when Farfarello extracted Schuldich's cell phone from his pocket and started to dial.

"Farf," Schu said incredulously, "what are you doing? They can trace that!"

Farfarello offered him the phone mutely.

Schuldich made a disgusted sound and took it. "What? Yeah. We're behind the Bloody Sunset. Somebody shot this kid and it's a real mess. You know where it is? Good, because there's three dead. Don't worry though. They're the bad guys." Despite the woman's annoying request for him to not hang up, he snapped the phone shut.

The girl was crouched over the body, swaying and mumbling under her breath.

"You might want to go before they find you here," Schuldich said conversationally. "Unless, of course, you don't want to abandon your friend." He sneered at that, but the girl ignored him. Farfarello took one step forward and knelt on the opposite side of the body, curious.

"Oh, gracious Lady of the moon, grant me now this simple boon…."

And Farfarello's lips spread in a smirk as her hands, pressed to the wound, glowed with a dark light so faint it might have gone unnoticed had he not been looking for it. A witch. She was a witch. Enemy of God.

What a night.

X-X-X